


to dust we shall return

by Qu-ko (Quthemighty)



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Desk Sex, F/M, Female Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Penis In Vagina Sex, Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2020-08-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:40:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26102068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quthemighty/pseuds/Qu-ko
Summary: [Elidibus stands up, pulling her with him, and gathers her into his arms like she is the most precious thing in the world.“So you think a three-second kiss will make everything all better, then?” he says, and she can hear both the dry humor and the crack of despair in his voice. “You are not bold enough, my friend…”]A lost moment in time, shortly before the end. Female WoL/Elidibus, major 5.3 spoilers.
Relationships: Elidibus/Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 44





	to dust we shall return

**Author's Note:**

> Forgive me, this is hot off the press and I know that's a cardinal sin. Maybe I'll go back and reread later.
> 
> It only takes three lines to gut punch someone, just so you know. :)

The woman at the door knocks, but doesn’t bother to wait for a response.

“I brought you dinner,” she says with an even voice from the threshold.

Elidibus makes a noise she supposes must be a hum of acknowledgment from the desk, but barely lifts his head long enough to register it’s her, much less show any trace of an expression. Paperwork is not normally the crux of their jobs, it’s true, but more often than not, it gets shafted onto him — no, no; more often than not, he _actively volunteers_ for it.

She wonders lately if it’s anything to do with the mounting stress from the _other_ thing he’s actively volunteered for.

He makes a sweeping glance at the box — some kind of fish dish with vegetables he doesn’t recognize on the side, something foreign and intriguing — and finally raises his head, straightening the curve of his back with a weariness that indicates he hasn’t done so in bells now.

...To her disappointment, it is only to pull in his chair before continuing where he left off.

“Thank you,” Elidibus says, neutral enough that she can’t read anything off of it.

“Do I need to take that pen out of your hands and feed it to you?” she asks with a tiny sigh. Elidibus is careful not to let his eyes catch hers, even though behind the red mask it’s impossible to tell. When he makes to ignore her, she plucks the instrument from his fingers.

He opens the side drawer to reveal about four-score more where that came from.

“That won’t be necessary,” he says, and there is the slightest hint of a sardonic smile on his face.

That’s it, she thinks to herself. Pulling up a chair, she seats herself on the other side of him, opening the box in the hopes the smell will do anything to prompt his hunger. It seems to do the trick, for his writing slows to a stop and his concentration wanes. He sets the pen back onto its inkwell in defeat.

“Take a break,” she says as he sets everything aside neatly. “The papers will still be there when you get back. But I may not be.”

There’s a wry little smile on her face at the last part. She’s not even supposed to be here, if she’s being honest, but the need to check on him was too great. Elidibus takes a moment to think about this, and then seems to accept the wisdom in it. He’s stubborn, but perhaps he can only be stubborn to a certain extent when it comes to pleasing the people around him.

“Fair enough.” But when he draws it closer, the way his nose wrinkles at the box has her stifling a laugh. “What is this? It smells like…”

“It’s a fish called haddock. Really mild and flaky. I learned how to create it when overseas, so I thought I might try cooking it and see what you thought.”

She can’t quite tell what the look on his face is behind the mask, but it looks suspiciously like disdain.

“Why?”

A simple enough question with a complicated answer. Her lips thin.

“Because I worry for you.”

“You’ve already made your stance on the summoning clear,” he reminds her sternly.

“That doesn’t mean I can’t express concern for your well-being.”

Elidibus does not appear impressed by that justification, but he still picks up the fork she’s provided and stabs it into the fish’s white flesh.

“You may like to cultivate your Convocation persona, but even you are only human,” she continues. _If not for long,_ her mind adds bitterly, but she quashes the thought down before it takes root into something far more upsetting.

A moment of silence passes. She tries some one-sided conversation while he eats, complete with some absent nods from Elidibus. Halfway through the meal, he lets his tongue dart out across his lower lip, searching for a stray bread crumb.

“Here,” she says, leaning across his desk with a napkin in her hand. She doesn’t fail to notice the sudden pinkish tone on his neck, and breaks into a small smile when she brushes away—

That is when Elidibus takes her wrist, pulling it away from his face and holding it off to the side with the grind of pebbly bones.

“Really now,” he asks with deeper concern than before, more personal, “what are you doing here? You know Lahabrea will have a fit if he catches you anywhere _near_ the building.”

Ah. It figures that would come up. She shifts uncomfortably, not wanting to talk about it at all if truth be told, but she supposes he deserves an answer.

“I’m not just going to turn my back on you over this. Emet-Selch and Lahabrea are angry at me, I know, and I can’t blame them, but…”

She trails off before continuing. There really is no excuse, is there? It must feel like a stab in the back to them. Of course it does.

“It’s not like I’m asking you to stop when I know you’re going to go through with it no matter what. But there are so, so many people out there tying up loose ends and spending their final days with loved ones right now, and I don’t understand why you aren’t one of them!”

“So that’s why… You came for a last supper, of sorts,” he comments evenly. His grip is still around her wrist, as if he’s still trying to convey something.

“Yes!” she hisses, frustration mounting. “Because I love you enough to set titles and circumstances aside! I know we don’t talk as much, I know we _can’t_ anymore, but I get worried that… when you become a god, will you think me a traitor then, too?”

What she says lingers in the air. The grip on her wrist lessens until he drops his hand entirely, but does not sit down again.

“No,” he says sparingly, still poker-faced. “I could never.”

The look she gives him is disarming. She can’t see his eyes, but he can see hers clear as day, catching a glint of light off of them behind her mask. “I’m glad,” she says. “Thank you.”

Elidibus sits down, turns to the window, and stares outside for a long passing moment. In the depths of his musing, he doesn’t notice her getting up and circling around the desk to his side, up until her hands slide underneath his jaw.

“Being alive means needing to eat, but being human means wanting to eat well,” she tells him as she tilts his face towards her. “Please don’t ever lose that.”

His lips part just a little. “I cannot promise you that. We know not what will happen to me… to _us_. And I’ve a nagging suspicion besides that the Will of the Star does not need to eat the way we do.”

“What can you promise, then?”

“…That I will save everyone. That we will get through this, and meet again as a family at duty’s end.”

She lets that percolate for a time, thoughtful, and then dips her head to kiss him. It’s revitalizing, much like the food she’d just given him, as if pouring energy into his soul as well as his body — but he frowns as she pulls away.

“I think I may be getting too bold,” she confesses sheepishly.

His actions speak otherwise. He fists a hand into the front of her robes and strikes back with surprising ferocity. Maybe it’s because he’s stressed and frustrated with the Zodiark summoning business, or maybe he misses her as much as she misses him. Well, that could just be wishful thinking…

But it certainly doesn’t _seem_ like wishful thinking. Elidibus stands up, pulling her with him, and gathers her into his arms like she is the most precious thing in the world.

“So you think a three-second kiss will make everything all better, then?” he says, and she can hear both the dry humor and the crack of despair in his voice. “You are not bold _enough_ , my friend…”

He dives for her lips again, just as she gets done thinking that it’s actually unfair how well he holds everything together even in times of great uncertainty, and it isn’t long before he’s pushing her back flat onto the desk, draping himself over her. He’s so close that she can feel every wrinkle in the fabric of his robes, and the rapidly burgeoning hardness that lies under them.

It’s fortunate that he set everything aside earlier, she thinks, else it would be a heaping mess on the floor right now. Though it seems more likely he’d be willing to throw it all out the window right now if push came to shove, looking at the desperation in his gestures.

Her robe falls away easily, and his fingers bury into her flesh, knuckles dragging along her smalls as he pulls her closer to the edge of the desk. Her own movements seem awkward in comparison, because Elidibus refuses to unhand her for even an instant. She’s never seen him this furious, and hearing him groan something that sounds like her name against her mouth, she would laugh if she were not struggling to breathe.

“This is truly what you want?” she asks thickly.

He grabs her by the hips and pulls down again right as she gets his white robe open, and she is tenfold more aware of him than before, by the heat of his skin and the prominence of his erection.

“Yes,” he half-growls, and she loses track of her thoughts from that word alone. Perhaps he is unable to answer any more eloquently than that, because he wastes little time in the following seconds hooking thumbs into her smalls and pulling them down, but she can’t bring herself to argue the point any further.

His hands gently pull her into him after he shoves his drawers down just enough to be serviceable — but not without a careful look, a last question, to which she replies with a smile. He leans down, and she buries her face in the nook of his shoulder, creating parallel lines along the bare skin of his neck by her nails dragging when they finally fit together. He grabs her hips and stills, trembling; she realizes he is giving her a moment and trying not to come in the meantime.

“I’m fine,” she says, and in the next moment his mouth is on hers and he brings himself to her once, twice, while the heat builds in her body.

It’s a thrilling sensation, smooth and discharging, something she can feel at the tips of her toes every time he drives into her. He touches the inside of her leg, sending sparks along her skin, then hooks it over his shoulder, suddenly revamping the feeling and overcharging it in such a way that she feels him better and harder than before. From the way he bites his lip, it seems like a wave of physical relief coming over him, breaking against the shore, shortening his breath and making his fingers shake. Him. _Elidibus_. The Emissary. It’s almost unbelievable that he would lower his guard so much for her.

“Oh—” she moans, her lips on his, half-drowned noises slipping. She notices him losing it, a long, subdued groan against her ear, and his hands hold her so hard she thinks her hips will bruise later. Her leg flexes over his shoulder, her toes curling, her other leg wrapping around his waist.

It’s the half-sentence he says that sends her over the edge, muttered hoarsely into her ear when he pulls her hard against him (“—you, Azem”). She almost thinks he does it on purpose, almost wonders if he knows how much she’s thought about his voice like this, but she’s too busy coming to deconstruct the thought.

He kisses a bead of sweat off her neck in the aftermath, then her lips, cheeks, forehead; anything he can reach. She doesn’t move as she catches her breath — doesn’t think her legs work yet — and Elidibus doesn’t remove himself from atop her just yet, either.

“I won’t forget this. Thank you,” he says, urgently, as if he’d forgotten to say it before. Sincerely.

She welcomes his confession with a radiant smile.

  


* * *

  


“In the end, I could not keep my promise,” he chokes out, clutching the crystals of the Convocation to his chest tenderly, and looks up at the Warrior of Light with tears pricking his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

But Azem is not there to answer him.


End file.
